Tim Grobaty: A talk with Justin Rudd of the nonprofit Community Action Team

Justin Rudd is the founder and director of the nonprofit Community Action Team (CAT).

Question: I had four things on my calendar for April, and I have four things for May. What've you got?

Answer: I'm a judge for the L.A. Junior Miss pageant on May 6, I'm going to a Mother's Day tea party with the MilliCan kids at Millikan on the 9th, I'm putting on a free Mother's Day concert of opera and classical music on the 13th, I'm speaking to a group of religious leaders on the 16th, I'm speaking at Career Day at Rogers Middle School on the 18th, I'm doing our beach clean-up and our dog poetry contest and moustache contest on the 19th. On the 20th, I'm the street announcer for the Pride Parade. And I'm going on vacation at the end of May.

Q: So, basically, not much.

A: May is a pretty light month for me. CAT is only doing the concert and the beach clean-up with the poetry and moustache contests. The others are things people have asked me to help them with.

Q: How many CAT events are there in a year?

A: We do 43 annual events.

Q: And you do it all without alcohol!

A: No, I don't drink. I've tasted alcohol, but it's just not my thing. I've never bought a drink.

Q: I know a lot of people who drink but have never bought a drink. How about coffee?

A: Never coffee. I don't like it. No alcohol, coffee or sushi. But I keep the chocolate industry in business. I buy 56-ounce bags of M&Ms. The dark chocolate ones and the pretzel ones. I'm a chocolate- and-Diet Coke person, which is bad, but that's why I run 5 miles every day.

Q: Does your partner, Ralph, run with you?

A: No. He's very supportive of everything I do, but he doesn't run with me. I like to listen to podcasts when I run.

Q: What do you listen to?

A: I listen to my preacher, Joel Osteen. And I listen to Grammar Girl a lot.

Q: I find it incredible, given all the things you're doing, that you don't own a cellphone.

A: I just have never got one.

Q: How do you manage to do so much without a cellphone?

A: It's just like it was before cellphones.

Q: Dark, joyless and scary?

A: People usually know where I am. On major events, like the Turkey Trot, where we get 6,500 people, we'll rent walkie-talkies.

Q: But you're no Luddite. You work the social network really well. You've sent something like 10,600 tweets.

A: My philosophy is if you don't tell people what you're doing they won't know what you're doing.

Q: How many people do you reach on Facebook?

A: On my regular Facebook page, I reached 5,000 friends the first year, then they cut you off, so I started fan pages. I reached 3,000 on that. My Belmont Shore! fan page has 11,200 fans, my Long Beach page has 21,800 fans. the Haute Dogs page has 10,370 fans. I have 35 fan sites that I moderate on Facebook.

Q: It's good that you don't drink, because you would probably drink a lot. Your dog Rosie was a great dog and inspired the Rosie Dog Beach, and now Riley's the top dog in CAT. I won't even bother you with the dog-or-cat question. But why did you chose CAT for the name of your organization?

A: I just thought the irony was clever. And I like the words. We work for the community, "action" is a good word for us, and so is "team."

Q: Were you this much of an organizer back in Ozark, Ala.?

A: I did some things. I was president of the Honor Society in high school and I was active in church, doing food drives and visiting nursing homes, but not on this sort of scale.

Q: Did you move from there to Long Beach?

A: I lived in North Hollywood for two years. I was a singer for Disney special events. I was a Dickens caroler at Disneyland, sang at the El Capitan for their "Toy Story" show. I had a lot of great singing opportunities.

Q: When you came to Long Beach did you hit the ground running?

A: No. The beach clean-up is 13 years old and it's the longest thing we've done. I moved here 16 years ago and at the time I only knew one person here. I just spent some time meeting people and trying to get involved. I started by getting some gay-themed events going. I did a supper club for gays on Monday nights, and I put together a gay sprint-dating event and a lesbian sprint-dating event, then it just kept branching out to other things.

Q: So what's next? After May, I mean?

A: It feels very right to be doing what I'm doing and where I'm doing it. I think we all get put in the right place at the right time.

Q: So, life is good?

A: Life is good and getting better. I believe that. I don't know what's down the road, but I know it'll be better, and it's pretty dog-gone good right now.